Striking Gold at Relentless Beats’ Goldrush Music Festival [Event Review]

After a successful inaugural 2017 edition, Goldrush Music Festival returned for its second year at Rawhide Western Town in Chandler, Arizona. On September 29 and 30, thousands of attendees saddled up for two full days of electronic dance music, hip hop, and all of the hidden treasures of the wild Wild West.

Rawhide Western Town is an 1880s western-themed entertainment venue equipped with old-timey shops, bales of hay, wagons, and mechanical bulls. Event organizers Relentless Beats, adopted the already built in theme and modeled the festival around it… with a slight raver makeover. The quaint little town had all of the festival-musts from fully stocked bars, giddy up grub, festival merchandise, rave/festival brand vendors, ferris wheel, art installations, and most importantly, four stages with state of the art production. Golden Gorge, Pioneer Peak, The Hideout, and Wagon Wheel made up the four Wild West stages that ultimately saw monumental performances from Chris Lake, Claptone, Deorro, deadmau5, Illenium, Louis The Child, Mikey Lion, Nodari, Sacha Robotti, Slushii, Steve Aoki, Yotto, and many more.

Now let’s trek back in time to the memorable experiences of Goldrush Music Festival. The first day we were met with the smiling faces of the Relentless Beats Rangers. The brightly dressed Rangers were out in full force, armed with good vibes and no judgement. They were out ensuring attendees were safe, hydrated, and having an amazing festival experience. If at any moment, festival goers needed a break or help of any kind, the ranger outpost was provided as a safe haven.

Day one began at The Hideout, which was hosted by Relentless Beats’ very own brand of house and techno, RBDeep. The Hideout brought out “La Fiesta” with UK-based tech house maestro Max Chapman followed by “Badass” beats from Born Dirty. Both artists had the crowd cutting shapes, kicking up dust, and shaking in their cowboy boots. Other notable performances here came from the musical masterminds of Claptone and Yotto. Claptone delivered a soulful house set equivalent to striking gold with his original “Under The Moon” from his dreamy Fantast album, as well as a stunning rendition of Aurora’s “Forgotten Love.” One of Anjunadeep’s rarest gems, Yotto, was up next and his progressive sound was exactly what we needed, especially since his new album Hyperfall has been on repeat since its release.

According to many of us here at RaverRafting, 2018 is the year of Chris Lake. So, naturally, he was up next on our Goldrush schedule. From the beginning to the end of his set, Chris Lake had us move our feet and “Lose Our Mind.” He threw down banger after banger, including “Pizza” from his Anti Up project and his latest original “Deceiver” with fellow industry veteran Green Velvet. Take a glimpse for yourself, here’s Chris Lake with “Pizza” at the Golden Gorge:

For the final showdown of the night, Hijakk was dominating the local favorite, Wagon Wheel, the outlaws were getting funky at The Hideout with Moon Boots, deadmau5 was debuting his iconic cube at the main stage, and the “Gunslinger” himself, Liquid Stranger, was ready to duel it out with his heavy bass.

To conclude our first night in the west, we went with the mau5trap leader, deadmau5. The legendary producer opened his set with “Monophobia,” a new song with Rob Swire from his outstanding new album mau5ville: Level 1. His set list consisted of a mixture of classics, new music, and even some unreleased tracks including “Strobe,” “Ghosts N “Stuff, “Some Chords,” “Channel 42,” and the highly-anticipated “Nosedive.” Between his original productions and awe-inspiring visuals of the cube, we were left mesmerized. Being in attendance for a deadmau5 performance is truly an unparalleled experience.

The next day we returned for our second journey back in time to the Wild West. The ole’ fashioned rodeo town was decorated with wanted signs featuring today’s most sought after acts or in this case outlaws of dance music, which we later found out to be event organizers, Relentless Beats, way of leaving clues for the lineup to come for their grand NYE music festival, Decadence Arizona.

Day two started out at the Golden Gorge with the rising Canadian dance duo Loud Luxury. The dynamic duo played their major hit “Body,” which fun fact has now garnered more than over 215 million streams on Spotify and won them a MMVA for “Best Song of the Summer.” The pair delivered an impeccable set, dropping an iconic mashup of  Ingrosso/Tommy Trash/John Martin’s original, “Reload” and Calvin Harris’ “One Kiss”, which you can watch below!

After this, we were mining for gold and by gold we mean house and techno. Now, there’s only one place to find these kind of hidden treasures at Goldrush Music Festival and that place happens to be The Hideout. On this day, the stage was hosted by the Desert Hearts gang and the lineup was stacked. The DH roster included hometown hero Gerry Gonza, Frank Terry, Sean Watson, Leftwing : Kody, Porky, Mikey Lion, Lee Reynolds, Guy J, and one of our favorites of the weekend, Marbs.

While house, techno, and love ethos were being spread at The Hideout, Pioneer Peak was blowing up with a mixture of genres. SAYMYNAME and Troyboi delivered their trap-infused beats, while the church of Black Tiger Sex Machine kept the spirit alive with their electro bass, and the hip hop was flowing with closing acts, Rich The Kid and Kevin Gates.

If you made your way to the Wagon Wheel, nestled near the Golden Gorge, then you caught some of Arizona’s most talented local DJs/producers. Artists such as Medicine Mike, Dylan Heckert, Super Friends, Nodari, Klu, and more took the decks, while the talented artist Sketchy Letters, did some live painting of the stage. One of the most memorable sets that we caught here was from Nodari. His mixture of hardstyle and happy hardcore literally called us to the stage.

Much of day two was spent at the main stage aka Golden Gorge. The lineup consisted of Loud Luxury, Matroda, Ekali, Slander, Louis The Child, Illenium, and Steve Aoki. Slander brought the Gud Vibrations with “Superhuman” and their unreleased, “Love Is Gone.” Louis The Child continued the future bass marathon with “Love Is Alive” and “Better Not.”

And, finally, Illenium with a live performance. Illenials were out in full force, all decked out in their Illenium merch awaiting the beloved artist to take the decks. The stage came alive with every pound of his drum pad, as he intoxicated the audience with his originals, “Leaving,” “Take You Down,” “Fractures,” “Beautiful Creatures, and finally concluding with the emotive “Crawl Outta Love.” The Colorado-based producer has a special way of connecting to the crowd and he accomplished just that with the perfect amount of raw emotion and bass.

Special thanks to Relentless Beats for having us again! We hope to see you RaverRafters at Goldrush 2019!

Photo Credit: Phoenix Gonzales

Connect with Goldrush Festival:
https://facebook.com/GoldrushFestAZ
https://twitter.com/goldrushfestaz
https://instagram.com/goldrushfestaz
http://goldrushfestaz.com

Connect with Relentless Beats:
https://facebook.com/relentlessbeats
https://twitter.com/RelentlessBeats
https://soundcloud.com/relentlessbeats
https://instagram.com/relentlessbeats
https://relentlessbeats.com

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